The AUT and NATFHE say six tests must be met before they would throw their weight behind any proposed changes in the Government’s imminent shake-up of the sector.
The current crisis in higher education has been caused by decades of under-funding. Class sizes have risen as funding per student has plummeted. Investment in teaching and research infrastructure has been as woefully inadequate as the level of academic salaries. Meanwhile, student debt has increased massively and the proportion of students from low income backgrounds has barely changed. The entire system desperately needs more funding.
While everyone waits for the Government’s deferred funding proposals for higher education, debate rages on how to find more money for the system. Increasingly, new style fees - top-up fees, fee deregulation or differentiated fees - are being presented as inevitable if Britain is to sustain internationally competitive universities.
NATFHE and AUT represent academic and related staff throughout higher education. Our members deliver high quality teaching, research and scholarship in the entire range of universities and HE colleges. They include those working in the institutions that have done so much to open up HE to a broader section of the population and to pioneer innovative courses in cutting-edge professions. We will be judging any proposals from the government, the devolved assemblies and the funding councils against six key tests.
Access
Will a new system enable more students who want to enter, and can benefit from, higher education to do so?
We support the government’s aim of opening up higher education to a broader range of students, including working-class, mature and part-time students and students with disabilities. But in England applications for HE have barely risen since fees were introduced in 1998 whereas in Scotland, where there are no up-front fees, applications are already above the government target of 50%. If the price of HE goes up the available evidence suggests that demand will go down.
How would higher fees help get more students into HE?
If individual student contributions are to remain part of the system, deferring payment until above average income levels have been achieved would be a far more convincing linkage between paying for HE and receiving a personal, financial benefit. Maintenance and other forms of financial support must be equally available to part-time and mature students.
Equity
Will a new system encourage more social equality and mobility?
In America the steadily rising costs of attending HE institutions over the past two decades have widened social inequality. It is now much harder for poor working-class or black students to get to university – especially the most sought-after universities. Social mobility is declining. In the UK, AUT and NATFHE look to further and higher education to offer equality of opportunity to all prospective students regardless of class and wealth.
Money for teaching
Will the new system generate more money for HE and for HE teaching?
When fees were introduced by this government in 1998, university grants were cut by a matching amount. There has been no extra income for HE.
Of course the government might let institutions keep the extra money from 'deregulated' or 'top-up' fees but it would only go to a few institutions. The most sought after universities might do well, but they are already the richest. Any new system must provide for all our HE students.
Additionally, those clamouring for top-up fees have made it clear that they are looking primarily for extra money for research. While research is indeed under-funded, there is no guarantee that additional funding from top-up fees would benefit undergraduate teaching. Teaching must have as high a priority as research. A key test of a new system should be whether it ensures that all students, in all HE institutions, get the teaching and learning support they need, as well as providing for an internationally competitive research base.
University places on merit
Will a new system give all students the opportunity to attend the right course at the right university for them?
If the most sought-after universities charge higher fees this could price out academically gifted but poorer applicants. Top US universities claim to be “needs blind” but in fact they enrol only a tiny proportion of disadvantaged students. UK universities arguing for top-up fees have said that they would expect the State, not them, to fund scholarships for the poor. Would such provision be available on a scale that would genuinely not deter any students from making educational choices based on cost? Or would we see a replication of the independent school system where only the particularly gifted few are funded in order to salve consciences?
The strengths of UK higher education
Will a new system preserve and enhance the strengths of the system we have?
One of the acknowledged strengths of our much-admired university and college system is that we have diverse HE institutions within a common national framework. There is a balance between diversity and the maintenance of common systems of setting degree standards, teaching quality assurance, research assessment, employment practices, and widening student participation. No one pretends that all institutions are the same, but they are all recognisably part of the same system. Any new funding system must sustain that commonality and not drive institutions into fragmented groupings based on students’ ability to pay.
Who benefits?
Will a new system draw its funding from all those who benefit from higher education?
The recent public debate about HE funding has focused heavily on the benefits individual students draw from their HE experience. But we must not become embarrassed to talk about the benefits to society as a whole, and to employers and industry in particular, of a vibrant research and teaching culture in a mass HE system. In particular the internationally competitive system our prime minister wants to maintain, and which it is claimed is under threat, is necessary for our society and economy as a whole. The onus to pay for a group of internationally competitive, leading- edge research universities should not be on their undergraduates who will only benefit indirectly from such activity. We will want to see that the share of state funding for HE at least matches that of comparator countries. America and most of Europe invest a much higher share of GDP in their universities than the UK.
We say
Income should not be a deterrent
to access to higher education.
The quality of educational experience across all HE institutions, while
different, should be broadly comparable.
Mature and part-time students, and students with disabilities should be included amongst those entitled to financial support.
Any individual contributions should be based on deferred payment triggered by above-average income levels.
Funding flowing into higher education must not be clawed back by the Treasury and must be directed at teaching as well as for research.
Public funding should be increased and based on the overall value to our society and economy of a vibrant, internationally competitive, mass HE system.
Conclusions
Deregulating fees and allowing universities to charge what they like would fail every one of the above tests. So too would top-up fees which allow universities to charge extra on top of the current flat rate fee.
The current UK flat rate fee system passes some of the tests. It is less unfair, less of a deterrent and less damaging than any of the top-up or deregulated fee options. It could be improved by guaranteeing that this extra income is not clawed back but channelled to help poorer students.
The Scottish system (being emulated in Wales and proposed in Northern Ireland) does pass these tests. Students do not pay fees up front but only when they have graduated and are earning more.
2003